Labour leadership

[agricola]

Finkelstein remarked it was a similar focus group that approved of Cameron in 2010, I do wonder if its a bubble and another Michael Foot scenario awaits(though I think Corbyn will actually engage with some of these voters.)

I am sure that is what he will be compared to, however he does have the considerable advantage that many of his policies - getting rid of NHS PFI, or building more council homes, or renationalization of the railways for instance - are going to result in lower government spending, not more. As long as they frame the argument for those policies in those terms then there shouldn't be a problem, though the way that they have responded to criticism of "Peoples QE" doesn't give me much confidence.

 

[killer b]

I think a focus group of swing voters now doesn't tell us that much about what they'll do in 5 years time: Corbyn's entire media presence over the past two months (and therefore for most people at all - outside anti-war or leftish circles he was essentially unknown) has been framed as him being unelectable lunatic hard left. Will that view remain once the air has cleared? Certainly with some people, but I think he's likely to make up some ground - he's a very persuasive speaker, and the policies he's proposing are - as we know - fairly mild & centrist, and someone who's not committed to the neo-liberal consensus should be able to score regular damage on the government in the tanking economy we're about to run into.

I'd be interested to see how he score among non-voters and those who voted Labour last time but have voted for others in the past - if he scores well with them (so retaining the Labour vote from this year, plus moving a load of non-voters to vote), then the swing voters can eat a bowl of dicks - he doesn't need them.

 

[treelover]

He may be successful attracting some of the millions that don't vote.

btwm, I visited Wortley Hall near Barnsley, nicknamed the Workers Stately Home, its now basically a wedding and conference centre, but is it a Co-op, I mentioned to the gardener Corbyn was coming to Sheff, she didn't know who he was.

 

[killer b]

(I actually think I hate swing voters more than I hate ideological tories. Their only ideology is the self)

 

[J Ed]

(I actually think I hate swing voters more than I hate ideological tories. Their only ideology is the self)

I know what you mean, especially those who wear it as a badge of pride by claiming that it makes them un-ideological and complex intellectually. Very vacuous people usually.

 

[seventh bullet]

He may be successful attracting some of the millions that don't vote.

btwm, I visited Wortley Hall near Barnsley, nicknamed the Workers Stately Home, its now basically a wedding and conference centre, but is it a Co-op, I mentioned to the gardener Corbyn was coming to Sheff, she didn't know who he was.

Nothing from anyone I know.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

I know what you mean, especially those who wear it as a badge of pride by claiming that it makes them un-ideological and complex intellectually. Very vacuous people usually.

Yes.

The thing i like least about FPTP is that elections are won and lost largely by the people with the least knowledge, who have given the least thought to it all, and are most likely to be swayed by the bollocks that the media puts out, or whether a potential PM looks like a dork eating a bacon sandwich...

 

[Argonia]

Bridget Christie has a Corbynator epiphany.

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/aug/29/jeremy-corbyn-moment-bridget-christie

 

[DotCommunist]

I know what you mean, especially those who wear it as a badge of pride by claiming that it makes them un-ideological and complex intellectually. Very vacuous people usually.

complex for believing manifesto pldeges lol

 

[SpookyFrank]

(I actually think I hate swing voters more than I hate ideological tories. Their only ideology is the self)

The worst part is that these idiots are the people who decide elections.

 

[J Ed]

Overspill from the 1500 capacity Crucible in Sheffield

 

[DotCommunist]

this belongs here rather than languishing in the trump thread:
A brief history of the british establishment losing it over corbyn

vice, but amusing for once.

 

[maomao]

The worst part is that these idiots are the people who decide elections.

No the worst part is that the political establishment knows this and has given up all pretense of even trying to engage with any other part of the electorate. Whole GE campaigns are now run entirely focused on the 50,000 or so ignorant cunts who actually have the ability to influence the result.

 

[J Ed]

The worst part is that these idiots are the people who decide elections.

Yes, I remember being admonished by someone at work after I tried to engage with him (rather than just calling him a cunt, I had to sit next to him for the next few months) when he confessed to voting Tory. He got extremely upset with me when I went through policy after policy with him, I couldn't identify one he actually supported other than repeal of the human rights act. In the end he actually started shouting at me, accusing me of being 'ideological' and a 'socialist' unlike him, he proudly told me that a 'true floating voter who reads all the manifestos'. The idea I guess is that having some fixed principles is bad.

He could talk for ages about things like that stupid Ed stone and the relative perceived 'conviction' of Miliband and Cameron. It really does come down to bacon sandwiches for some people.

 

[Libertad]

Yes, I remember being admonished by someone at work after I tried to engage with him (rather than just calling him a cunt, I had to sit next to him for the next few months) when he confessed to voting Tory. He got extremely upset with me when I went through policy after policy with him, I couldn't identify one he actually supported other than repeal of the human rights act. In the end he actually started shouting at me, accusing me of being 'ideological' and a 'socialist' unlike him, he proudly told me that a 'true floating voter who reads all the manifestos'. The idea I guess is that having some fixed principles is bad.

He could talk for ages about things like that stupid Ed stone and the relative perceived 'conviction' of Miliband and Cameron. It really does come down to bacon sandwiches for some people.

In the face, with a chair. Top tip for you there.

 

[teqniq]

I started reading

Jeremy Corbyn will have to learn Blairite lessons if I'm deputy, says Caroline Flint

but rapidly discerned another Blairite drone and skipped to the comments where I found this Vice article which pretty much confirmed my worst suspicions and more.

Where the fuck do all these people come from? It's like they're from the planet Scumbag or something.

 

[ViolentPanda]

this belongs here rather than languishing in the trump thread:
A brief history of the british establishment losing it over corbyn

vice, but amusing for once.

The author writes for The Morning Star on her day job. Nice lass. I've chatted with her a couple of times.

 

[two sheds]

No the worst part is that the political establishment knows this and has given up all pretense of even trying to engage with any other part of the electorate. Whole GE campaigns are now run entirely focused on the 50,000 or so ignorant cunts who actually have the ability to influence the result.

and pensioners, don't forget pensioners

 

[Sifta]

one women saying "he would attack the rich and that's not good"

This fuckwit nearly cost me a TV

 

[DotCommunist]

Where the fuck do all these people come from?

high end private school system with a dose of ambition thats far more than healthy. I mean everyone should want something, even if its to make the worlds largest lego tower or something, but these people have gone beyond that into 'would lick satans scrotum for advancement'

 

[brogdale]

Just in case they didn't get the message last time...

A defiant Tony Blair has dramatically re-entered the debate over Labour’s future with an 11th-hour appeal to party members to come to their senses and reject the “Alice in Wonderland” politics of Jeremy Corbyn.

The former prime minister and winner of three general elections says Corbyn’s supporters are operating in a “parallel reality” which rejects evidence and reason, and says their leftwing choice for leader will be an electoral disaster.

“parallel reality”

 

[Mr.Bishie]

lol

 

[DotCommunist]

everytime blair comes out to scold everyone again, corbyn gains another ten undecideds to his camp lol

 

[teqniq]

Yup

 

[J Ed]

Just in case they didn't get the message last time...

​

“parallel reality”

I just hope that there is at least a little part of Blair which is frightened that this might be the beginning of a path which leads to him being put on trial for war crimes.

 

[brogdale]

lol

It's like they're engaged in an exercise to minimise the size of Corbyn's first ballot majority. I suppose if he wins big the coup will be harder to effect.

 

[free spirit]

evidence and reason...

how fast could those WMDs be deployed in Iraq again Mr Blair?

 

[brogdale]

evidence and reason...

how fast could those WMDs be deployed in Iraq again Mr Blair?

"I only know what I believe."

 

[J Ed]

evidence and reason...

how fast could those WMDs be deployed in Iraq again Mr Blair?

IIRC the current neocon justification for WMDs is that ISIS has used chemical weapons therefore Saddam must have had them thereby justifying the Iraq War

 

[free spirit]

The Labour Party under blair didn't do evidence and reason at all, it did gut instinct, focus groups and media opinion.

When the evidence / experts they consulted disagreed with their policies they over-ruled them and discredited them, as with Prof Nutt and the ACMD and drugs policy, and in the energy field where the government started with a comprehensive industry wide review of energy policy, devised policy from that basis, then scrapped that policy because it didn't support a new generation of nukes, and rewrote it themselves to support a new generation of nuclear power.

Corbyn's economic policies are widely supported by credible economists.